Woods was largely repeating sworn testimony he gave in a successful lawsuit against the city. And the implications are remarkable. Because - if true - it indicates more than a federal crime. It implies that the organization created to give minority-owned businesses a leg up in this town - the Birmingham Construction Industry Authority - can also keep those businesses pinned to the mat.

Boom.

In the meeting and in testimony in his suit - in which the city paid him a $2.5 million judgment - Woods said BCIA Executive Director Michael Bell, brother of Mayor William Bell, came to see him with BCIA second-in-command David Merrida, and the two told him "I need to pay them in order to play."

His testimony gave slightly more detail. In it he said Michael Bell and Merrida told him he should "just work with the white contractors and be a sub to them."

Woods said Merrida tried to get him to join the Association of Minority Contractors, but Woods said he didn't want to be identified as a minority firm, he just wanted to do real work.

"I refused to join them. And they said, 'well, you going to have a lot of problems,'" he testified. "I said, well, no, I don't intend to have problems. I don't want to join it. I'm not joining any minority. I really didn't want this stigma that I'm out to get set asides."

It was Merrida, Woods testified, who said Woods would fail "because I was not paying anybody and said I needed to share this money."

Attempts to reach Michael Bell and Merrida were unsuccessful, but Bell, in an interview with NBC 13's John Paepcke, denied the claims.

But the allegations speak to a concern that has long haunted Birmingham, tainted the political process, promoted corruption and kept black contractors from blossoming into competitive companies.

Birmingham and its boards and agencies have worked, along with the BCIA, to ensure that black-owned businesses get their share of government work. But those in the business - black and white - have argued that the system succeeds only in making sure favored minority companies get a check.

It does not help build those businesses. To the contrary, it keeps them trapped in minority roles and makes them vulnerable to political whims, susceptible to financial demands, and prevents them from growing in size or expertise.

It pays them, in essence, to keep them from becoming competitive.

If the BCIA - an organization born 26 years ago as a result of a consent decree in a discrimination case - is complicit in that failure, then the system is corrupt. It is corrupt in the name of fairness, and that is explosively ... repugnant.

Of course we don't know, aside from one man's sworn testimony, if the allegations are true. We don't know if it is Birmingham business as usual.

But we know is the system is broken.

And there has never been a better time for federal and state investigators to be poking around these city boards and agencies.